


A Modest Proposal

by GoldandScarlett



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Christmas fic, Fluff, M/M, also clints gf can be whoever you want, and I didn't wanna be that guy, bucky/nat kinda, but know that in my heart its bobbi, like they are there just
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-19
Updated: 2019-12-19
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:00:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21863368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GoldandScarlett/pseuds/GoldandScarlett
Summary: Tony Stark invites Steve to come help him pick out a Christmas tree. Bucky thinks it's a front for Christmas romcom romance. Steve thinks Bucky is being absurd. Read on to find out which of them is actually right about Tony's intent in this completely riveting and wholely original tale.No one eats any babies in this Christmas fic. In case that needed to be specified.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 5
Kudos: 71





	A Modest Proposal

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for a friend as a holiday gift in 2016. Then last fall I was on a plane and I was bored so I started editing it, and figured I'd have it revamped in time for that December. I finished it in like, May of this year so that says some unflattering things about my work ethic I guess, but here we are. (Fun fact, my edits were basically me going, "This is no longer for my friend so I'm gonna add too many scenes with Clint Barton in them.")

"Your frat boy boyfriend is here," Bucky announced, marching into his and Steve’s shared dorm room and plopping onto his bed. 

"He's not my boyfriend," Steve said, his ears pinking, "And he's not in a frat." 

“Does Stark know that?” Bucky asked. 

“What, that he’s not my boyfriend or that he’s not in a frat?” 

Bucky gave him a look, and Steve grinned. “Precision of language, Bucky.”

“What are you, a fucking professor? The point is not my shitty grammar, or whatever the fuck ‘precision of language’ is. The point is your shitty crush on the shitty Tony Stark and  _ Jesus, _ Rogers, I thought you had taste.” 

Steve gave Bucky a baleful look, but any retort or, more likely, flustered explanation he may have had was interrupted by a knock on the door.

"Steve? Are you in there? Your asshole roommate says I can't come in."

"Bucky!" Steve hissed.

"What? I told you he was here.”

Steve threw him an accusatory look as he went and opened the door. 

Tony Stark was standing in the hallway, his fingers stuck in his belt loops, his face partially obscured by a veritable river of red scarf. 

“Hi, Tony,” Steve said, and then taking in the ridiculous apparel, “Why is your scarf so long?” 

Tony shrugged, “Mostly so I could make a joke about it not being the only thing that’s long. Also it’s really warm. Why, does it look stupid?” 

“It’s cute,” Steve muttered, his ears going very red. 

"You guys are gross," Bucky said, more to the world than to Tony and Steve specifically. 

“Oh go fuck yourself, Barnes,” Tony retorted, cheerfully. Then to Steve, “We’re still on for picking out a Christmas tree, yeah?”

Tony stayed in a very large apartment right off campus, that he rented with his friend Rhodey (who, Bucky was fairly certain, did not actually pay any of the rent, which marked a generosity in Tony’s character that Bucky hated having to examine). He kept trying to get Steve and Bucky to move in with him, but Steve hated the idea of taking charity and Bucky hated the idea of having to live with Tony Stark, although he did occasionally allow Steve to succeed in dragging him over for visits, solely so that he could pilfer avocados from Stark’s fruit bowl. Bucky had no idea why Stark owned a fruit bowl, much less fruit to put in it. According to Steve, the guy lived entirely off coffee and cold pizza. (Which Bucky supposed he probably couldn’t judge given how close he himself was with Clint Barton. But still.) Possibly, Tony had a team of hired servants to do things like buy fruit, but even Bucky was forced to begrudgingly admit that Stark didn’t really throw his money around in quite that way. It was far more likely that Rhodey bought them. 

It was Rhodey (allegedly) who was responsible for Steve and Tony’s Christmas tree date. Apparently, he wanted one for the house. At least, that’s what Steve had said when he’d explained the nature of his outing to Bucky. 

“Did Stark tell you Rhodey wanted a tree or did Rhodey tell you?” Bucky had asked.

“Uh, Tony told me.” Steve said. 

“So Rhodey wants a Christmas tree for their house but he just  _ happens _ to be too busy to go and get it himself?’

“What’s that supposed to mean,” Steve asked. 

“It’s a front, Steve.”

“It’s not a front, Bucky. Rhodey just has training. Why would you think it’s a front?” 

“Because it  _ is _ . It’s totally a front! He’s tricking you into going on a cute Christmas-y date with him. That’s the same shit that happens in every Christmas romcom, Steve, and you can’t pretend you don’t know that because the only reason  _ I  _ know that is that you drag me to watch that shit. He’s obviously into you. Just make out already, this hope that you’ll come to your senses and get over Tony Stark is really starting to mess with my head.”

“If it’s a front, it’s very flattering that Tony would go through all that effort just to spend time with me,” Steve said, primly. “But he doesn’t like me like that.” He made his mournful Steve Rogers face for a moment, and then he must have realized he was doing it because it vanished back into whatever oubliette Steve kept his darker emotions locked away in. “Also, I don’t think Tony Stark is the manipulative mastermind you think he is, Buck,” he added. 

“He absolutely is. Tony Stark is the fucking worst.”

“Why do you hate him so much anyways?” Steve asked, in the same tired, vaguely reproachful voice he used every time he asked the question. 

And Bucky had replied, “He’s a borderline alcoholic sex addict with moods that swing the whole curve of the Brooklyn Bridge,” because if Steve was mad at him, then he wasn’t being sad about Tony Stark not liking him, even though Tony Stark obviously liked him. 

Except in his haste to come up with a reply that would make Steve suitably angry, he’d overcalculated, because Steve had said, “You’re being really mean,” and then refused to speak to Bucky until he’d finally given up and apologized, three days later. 

“Yeah,” Steve said now. He grinned. “I love Christmas. Everyone’s so happy.” 

“See, I fucking hate it,” Tony said. Then he grinned, slightly lopsided. “That’s why I’m buying this tree. In an effort to get mother fucking festive. Also cause Rhodey bullied me.” He added, as something of an afterthought. Totally a fucking front. 

Steve started to reply, but Bucky was briefly distracted from his eavesdropping by his window opening; the books he’d stacked on its sill earlier that afternoon were shoved off it by the hand of some unseen person. A few of them bounced off the bed and onto the floor, where they landed with a series of dull thumps. It any of his post-it notes had been dislodged, Bucky was going to  _ kill  _ Clint. The same Clint swung his body through the window, and launched himself onto the bed, toppling Bucky over in the process, which had no doubt been his intention. 

“Jesus  _ fuck _ , Barton! Use the motherfucking door for fuck’s sake. That’s what it’s motherfucking there for.”

He heard Steve start to ask if he was okay, and then cut himself short when he saw Clint. Clint flinging himself through windows to inflict bodily harm on his best friend had stopped being a surprising part of Steve’s life a long time ago. 

“Headed out, Buck,” he called. “Nice to see you, Clint!” Then the door closed behind him. 

Bucky turned on Clint with his fiercest glower. “Nice of you to  _ drop in _ ,” he said. 

Clint picked up one of Bucky’s pens and began spinning it between his fingers with almost supernatural quickness, looking supremely unperturbed. “That joke gets funnier every time, Buck,” he said. “Please, feel free to continue using it forever. He sent the pencil flying across the room to embed itself in Steve’s corkboard. “So you look pissy.”

“Steve’s going on a date with Stark.”

“Well, good for him. I’m with Steve. Tony’s a nice guy once you get past his, you know, his gilding.”

“His  _ what?” _

“Gilding? Like you know. The gilded age. Gold on the surface but then it’s like, tin or whatever? Only I guess the surface shit is the problem here so… reverse gilded?” 

“What are you even  _ saying _ , Clint?” Bucky said. 

“I’m saying he’s got like, a heart of gold or whatever. Asshole.” 

“Ugh,” said Bucky, and flopped back onto his bed to glower at the ceiling.

“I would give you a consoling head pat,” Clint said. “But you bullied my prose so you don’t deserve them anymore. Hey, do you still have those gross ketchup flavored chips?”

“No. Buy your own.” Bucky said, but Clint was already heading for his snack drawer. 

***

Outside it was snowing and the trees were tinged with a crystalline sheen that made Steve want to pull out a paintbrush and capture the fairytale-ness of it down forever. Tony would have made fun of him for using words like “crystalline sheen” and “fairytale-ness” to describe a snowfall. Tony himself had no such romantic inclinations towards winter weather. He often told Steve that, first chance he got, he was moving to Malibu, but Steve was pretty sure he would miss New York too much to be able to follow through with it. Still, Steve refrained from commenting on the beauty of the snow, although he could not help thinking how it would have made Tony even madder to know how charming Steve found the way the snow clung briefly to Tony’s hair and his ridiculous scarf before melting away. 

Tony’s car was still parked at his apartment. By the time they arrived, their cheeks were rosy with cold, and Steve was having some trouble remembering what his toes felt like. 

“You want some hot chocolate or something?” Tony offered, although he’d already pulled his car keys out and was proceeding to toss them back and forth between his hands. 

Steve thought he was acting rather like someone trying to get a bad thing over with quickly, and remembered what he’d said earlier about hating Christmas. Tony’s keys made a clunking noise as he caught them again, and Steve wanted to reach out and grab them and also maybe not so accidently grab Tony’s hand in the process. 

“No, thank you,” Steve said, stuffing his own hands decidedly into his pockets. “We can have some when we get back after we’ve gotten  _ really  _ cold. Or maybe they’ll sell it there. Or hot cider!”

“You people and your lukewarm apple juice,” Tony said.

“What do you mean ‘you people’?” Steve said. “What group am I being put in here?” 

Tony waved his hand around vaguely as he unlocked the car. “You know. You people. The people who like hot cider. A monstrous and misguided group.” 

“You drink cider,” Steve said, because Tony had, at the party Clint had thrown the previous weekend. 

“No,” said Tony. “I drink  _ spiked  _ cider, and I only drink  _ that  _ because it has alcohol. Parking lot Christmas tree market cider is not going to have that single redeeming quality.” 

“Speaking of which…”

“Yeah, really. Get in the car, Rogers. It’s fucking freezing.” 

Tony’s car was warm at least, and they found a radio station that played obnoxious Christmas carols, so they sang them the whole way. Well, Steve sang them. Tony changed all the lyrics to be as sexual as possible, apparently playing the “How much can I make Steve Rogers blush?” game. Steve was really not as prudish as all his friends seemed to think he was, but there was a big difference between listening to Bucky and Clint make dirty jokes back and forth, and having Tony Stark singing the stuff at him, his voice occasionally crumbling into laughter. But of course, there was no way of explaining the nuances of these differences to Tony in a way that did not at least touch upon the issue of Steve being hopelessly completely in love with him, so he only shrugged sheepishly in response to Tony’s good-natured mockery, and upped the volume of his own singing. 

Tony, of course, responded by raising his voice to match. They were both rather hoarse by the time they reached the Christmas tree market. 

“You know what?” Tony said. He’d loosened up in the car, but now the odd stiffness Steve had noticed earlier was starting to come back. “I know I talked some mean trash, but I actually could use a hot cider. My throat is dying. I’ll grab you one too.You can start looking for a tree. I’ll just be a sec.”

“I can come too. I mean, we’re not in a rush or anything, right?” Steve said, keeping his voice deliberately unaffected by Tony’s shift in mood. 

“Yeah.” Tony shrugged. “I guess we’re not. Okay.”

They made their way through the market over to the stand advertising hot cider. The whole area was strung over with fairy lights, and the occasional wreath, and Steve wanted to linger over them, but everytime he turned his attention away from Tony, he would find him ten feet ahead, marching towards the cider stand with a grimly determined expression on his face. 

So in the end he just chased after him and then Tony bought them both cider (even though Steve insisted he could pay for his own) and made overly disgusted faces while drinking his. At least the faces were a bit more like normal Tony. 

“Not  _ so _ bad right,” Steve said. 

“The worst.” Tony crumpled up his empty cup and lobbed it at a nearby trash can, where it bounced against the side and fell into the dirt. “This is a fucking conspiracy,” Tony said, as he went trudging over to get it. 

Steve sent his own empty cup sailing past Tony’s head and into the trash can, grinning when Tony flipped him off. Then the two of them ventured in amongst the trees. 

Despite Tony’s self proclaimed complete lack of interest in the Christmas tree shopping experience, he seemed to have very specific feelings on where he and Steve ought to be going, and would sometimes even grab Steve’s hand to steer him if he felt him to be loitering too long in one area or going in the wrong direction. Steve, who normally would have protested such treatment, could not even find it within himself to be quietly annoyed.

"I should have just bought one of those giant plastic trees and been done with it," Tony said as he led Steve along. He still seemed a little on edge, but he did grin at the horrified expression on Steve's face. 

"Plastic trees are not in the spirit of Christmas," Steve informed him.

“Sure they are. Commercialism. It will make everything holy into a plastic knock off it can sell on the free market. It’s an all-American Christmas, Steve."

"Thanks for that, Tony," Steve said. "Really inspirational."

Tony shrugged. "I try." 

The circuitous route Tony had chosen finally landed them near the edge of the artificial grove. It was oddly empty over here, especially considering the quality of the trees. 

“Come  _ on _ , Rogers. Stop gawking,” Tony said. He grabbed Steve’s hand again and dragged him along into a clearing, where one tall fir stood all on its own. It had been set up in a tree stand already, and when Steve and Tony entered the clearing, the silver lights which it was strung sprang suddenly to life. They illuminated a single, red ornament hung on one of the middle branches, upon which was painted a heart. 

Steve laughed, delighted. “I think we’re interrupting someone’s proposal,” he said, and turned to grin at Tony. 

Tony was not grinning back. In fact, Tony’s face had the sort of shuttered expression it got sometimes when he was talking to his father on the phone, or in some of the interviews Steve had watched of him on youtube. (Steve had only watched one or two. It felt sort of horrifyingly invasive and besides, Tony looked so uncomfortable in all of them.) Steve, who had been resisting the urge to ask all day, found himself saying “Hey, are you okay?” before he could really think about it. 

“Right,” Tony said, as though he hadn’t heard the question. “Listen Steve, I uh- I mean-” The shuttered expression was falling off, replaced by one of equal parts anger and frustration. Steve was about to interrupt him to say that if he’d done something to make him uncomfortable, he wasn’t going to be mad if Tony told him so. But then Tony said, “Oh my god, this was stupid. Fuck. Just a second.” Then he turned and walked off into the trees with a sort of affected rush, as though he were trying very hard to keep himself from running.

Steve stared after him for a moment, utterly bemused. Then he turned back to the tree, glittering placidly amongst the falling snow. It did look very lovely, with the glow of the lights casting a kind of halo over that one red ornament. He hoped whomever was getting proposed to said yes because whoever had arranged for the tree had put a lot of effort into it and it was lovely and sweet and romantic. 

Then he blinked. It was hard to put the two together, as he’d spent so long utterly convinced that Tony Stark did not think of him in the way Steve wanted him to, but Steve wasn’t an idiot, nor was his self esteem so abysmal that he wasn’t going to at least consider the evidence. He spun on his heel and ran off after Tony. 

It took Steve a bit of searching. The Christmas tree market was huge. It was labyrinthian. Who made a labyrinthian Christmas market anyways? Steve was feeling the least joyous towards the holiday season that he had perhaps ever felt by the time he finally found Tony. He was at the very edge of the lot, where it hit up against the wall of the supermarket, and he was sitting on the concrete with his knees pulled up to his chest and his back pressed against the brick wall of the building, spinning his phone in his hands. 

“I’d like a minute, Steve,” he said, not looking up. 

“Are you sure?” Steve asked. Privately, he weighed the odds of sitting down next to Tony, and decided it was probably not the best idea right now. “Because I uh, I think I figured out who made the tree and I hope you’re not offended if I’m wrong but I wa-”

“I wasn’t proposing,” Tony interrupted. “I was just asking you out. It was too much, wasn’t it? Pepper always says I go for too much. Fuck.”

“No, I-” Steve started to say, but apparently now that Tony had started his explanation he was going to finish it, because the words just kept pouring out of him, drowning Steve’s protests beneath them. 

“I had this whole plan with this stupid Christmas tree grove because you make me and Bucky watch all those awful, cheesy Christmas rom-coms and you love Christmas and I know you’ve probably spent all day thinking romantic shit about the snow or whatever and I wanted to do something special that I thought maybe you’d like.” Tony barely paused to take a breath before barrelling onward. “But I definitely went way too overboard with that, like I go way too overboard with everything. And now I’ve made it super weird.”

“Wait, no. I-”

“No, it’s okay. I’m just gonna go before I do anything else stupid. Sorry I ruined this whole-” He waved his hand, sweeping wildly across the whole of the Christmas tree market. “I dunno. Whatever this was. Fucking Christmas.”

“Tony, wait.”

“Oh fuck. I’m your ride aren’t I. Jesus, I did  _ not _ think this through. I got so focused on those fucking pressure plates for setting off the fucking tree lights. One sec, I’ll call you an uber. Or, no, I’ll call you a lyft. Uber’s a bad-”

Steve kissed him. It was a fast chaste kiss. Even if Tony did like him, Steve reasoned, he didn’t necessarily want to kiss him right then. When he pulled back, Tony’s hands went up like they were going to grab him and pull him back, and then he dropped them to his lap again and sat staring at Steve, almost dazed. 

“I- What?” 

“I like you too, Tony,” Steve said. “Sorry for kissing you. I just- I wasn’t sure how to get you to stop talking so I could tell you.”

“Sorry for- Oh my god, Steve.” Then Steve was being pulled back again and they were kissing properly this time, kissing and kissing and kissing, and Steve couldn’t breathe. All he could do was open his mouth and pull Tony as close to him as he could. 

Finally, Tony pulled back. His smile was a little shaky around the edges, but it was definitely a smile.“I’m not apologizing for that,” he said. 

“Good,” said Steve, which was about as articulate as he could manage at the moment. He reached out and intertwined his hand with Tony’s and Tony’s smile turned a little softer. He leaned over a little so he was pressed up against Steve’s side. 

“I liked your tree,” Steve said a moment later. “It was very Christmas rom-com.”

“It would have been more Christmas rom-com if I hadn’t run off,” Tony said. His tone was joking now, but there was still a faint edge to it, a trace of the voice that had been streamlining out explanations and apologizes earlier. 

“I liked it,” Steve said. “And I like you too.”

“Gross,” said Tony, but he leaned over and kissed Steve again, and his smile was very bright indeed. “It’s a goddamn Christmas miracle,” he said. 

“Hey so do you actually hate Christmas?” Steve asked, “Or was that mostly just you being really nervous about asking me out?” 

“Oh I actually hate-” Tony started, and then he paused and seemed to examine Steve’s face for a moment. “I’m not the biggest fan of Christmas,” he said carefully. “It was well, you know my family. I’ve just never actually had a good one before is all. But I think I could like Christmas, with the right people.” 

Steve grinned. “I can make that happen,” he said.

Epilogue

“I can’t believe he would do this to me.” Bucky was saying mournfully, as Clint, perched on the edge of his bed and balanced on the soles of his heels, regarded him skeptically. 

“Let it go, man. Tony’s a nice guy. Now, are we gonna go shoot shit or are you gonna fucking mope all day? Because some of us are trying out for the Olympics here…” 

“I just-” Bucky was  _ not _ moping. He was reasonably aggrieved and fuck Clint Barton for thinking otherwise. “He’s such an asshole Clint. I can’t let my best friend date such an asshole.”

Clint shrugged, unimpressed by this tragedy. “My best friend is dating you and you’re the biggest asshole on the planet. Seriously dude.  _ Chill.” _

“Thought I was your best friend.”

“Come on Barnes, you know I wouldn’t even know your name if you weren’t dating Nat.”

“That’s true,” agreed Natasha, popping in through the window to settle beside Bucky. “Clint doesn’t really remember a lot of people’s names.”

“I’m on the third fucking floor,” Bucky grumbled, but he leaned over and accepted the kiss Nat offered. 

“So is that a no on the going shooting then?” Clint asked. 

Bucky felt totally justified in ignoring Clint in favor of making out with his girlfriend. After all, he’d had a rough day, and his girlfriend was really hot. He deserved this. 

“Whatever,” Clint said, “I’ll ask Kate. Hey! Guys! Come on!” A shoe hit Bucky in the back of the head. “Pay attention to me.”

“Who the fuck is Kate?” Bucky said, lobbing the shoe back in Clint’s direction. “Your girlfriend?”

“Dude, you’ve  _ met _ my girlfriend.”

“You’ve met Kate’s girlfriend too,” Natasha added. “And Kate.” 

“I can’t be expected to think about who’s dating who right now,” Bucky said. “It will just depress me.”

“Well good,” said Clint. “Since you don’t want to think about your girlfriend, you can come to the shooting range with me. Come on. I’m bringing my best friend. I think you’ll hit it off.”

“Ugh.” Bucky groaned, and pulled himself up off the bed to go retrieve the definitely very against dorm regulations throwing knives that he kept in his bottom drawer. “Fine,” he said. 

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all may think that the illusive girlfriend of Kate's is America Chavez or maybe Cassie Lang but you are wrong. It is me.


End file.
